Massachusetts state-law case involving ownership of the plate for a map of Rhode Island.  This ended up as US Supreme Court, Stephens v. Cady, about copyright law (reported here, if interested: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/55/528/), more specifically how ownership of the plate reflects - or does not reflect - ownership of the copyright.  The case originated in the Court of Common Pleas from Bristol County, in a case involving Sarah suing her presumably former husband for damages and receiving his property - the printing plate.  A section of Isaac Cady’s answer in the US Supreme Court Transcript of Record follows as context:

 

Sarah Stevens, of Fall river, in Massachusetts, on the 1st day of April, A. D. 1846, having recovered a judgment against said James Stevens for one hundred and seventy-six dollars damages, and eighteen dollars and twenty-three cents, costs of suit, before the court of common pleas, held at Taunton, in and for Bristol county, in said State of Massachusetts, on the second Monday of March, 1846, which court had jurisdiction of said cause, took out from said -court an execution duly issued by said court under the seal thereof and signed by the clerk thereof, and dated the 11th day of April, 1846, all in due form of law, ready to be produced and shown as this honorable court may direct, commanding the sheriff of said county of Bristol, that of the goods, chattels, or land of the said James Stevens, within said county, he should cause to be paid and satisfied unto said Sarah Stevens, or the value thereof in money, the said sum of one hundred and ninety-four dollars and twenty-three cents in the whole, and twenty five cents for said writ of execution, and thereof also to satisfy himself for his lawful fees in the premises, and for want of such goods, chattels, or lands of the said James Stevens, by him shown or found within his precincts to the acceptance of the said Sarah, the said sheriff was commanded in and by said writ to take the body of said James Stevens, and him commit to the county jail at Taunton or New Bedford, in said county of Bristol, and him detain in custody within said jail until he should pay the slim above mentioned with the fees thereon, or be lawfully discharged by said Sarah or by order of law, and that said sheriff should make due return of said writ, with his doings thereon; all which will more fully appear by the records and files of said court of common pleas, for said Bristol county, copies of which are ready to be shown and produced as this honorable court may direct.

And this deponent further answering saith, that said James Stevens neglected to pay said debt and satisfy said execution, and left or turned out at Fall River aforesaid, within the precincts of the sheriff to whom said execution was delivered to be collected, and then and thereby turned out to said sheriff said copperplate on which said map was engraved, by leaving or placing the same where said sheriff might levy on the same in default of payment of said execution; and because said James Stevens neglected to pay and satisfy said execution, and left said property to satisfy the same, said sheriff, at Fall River aforesaid, on or about the 25th day of April, 1846, levied said execution upon said copperplate, so as aforesaid engraved for printing said maps, and duly posted and advertised the same for sale to satisfy said execution, and, after the expiration of more than four days after said levy, and, after giving said James Stevens full opportunity to pay said execution, and save said property from being sold if he had chosen so to do, said sheriff, on or about the 6th of May, 1846, at Fall river aforesaid, sold at public auction said copperplate so as aforesaid engraved with said engraving thereon, to this defendant, Isaac H. Cady, for the sum of two hundred and forty-five dollars, he being the highest bidder for the same; and on the 9th day of May, 1846, this defendant paid said sheriff said sum of two hundred and forty-five dollars for said plate, and received the same from said sheriff's his own property.